Garden Fresh Tapas

This is a mildly spiced, refreshing and healthy appetizer. Tomatoes and cucumbers are filled with sprouted moong or flavored cream cheese. It makes an amazingly colorful finger food that is easy to prepare and tastes incredible.

Recipe will serve 4.

Ingredients:

2 small firm tomatoes

8-1/2 inch long English Cucumber pieces

Sprout Topping

1/4 cup moong sprouts

1/2 teaspoon oil

¼ teaspoon cumin seeds

1 teaspoon minced ginger

1/8 teaspoon black pepper

1/4 teaspoon salt

Few drops of lemon juice

1 tablespoon of water

Cream Cheese Topping

2 tablespoons cream cheese

½ teaspoon minced ginger

1/4 teaspoon salt

Pinch of black pepper

1 teaspoon finely chopped cilantro or dill

Method

Prepare Sprouts: In a small frying pan, heat the oil on medium heat. Add cumin seeds and as they crack add sprouts, ginger, black pepper and water. Cook for 2-3 minutes until sprouts are tender. Remove pan from heat. Add lemon juice, stir and set aside.

Prepare cream cheese topping by mixing all the ingredients. Set aside.

Cut tomatoes in half and scoop out the seeds creating hollow bowls.

Take cucumber slices and scoop out the seeds, creating small bowls.

Fill all tomatoes and 4 cucumber slices with moong sprouts.

Fill the remaining 4 cucumber slices with cream cheese filling.

Serve and enjoy!

How to make sprouts

Soak the whole moong for 10 to 12 hours. Water should be about four times more than the Moong.

After soaking moong, it will double in volume.

Drain the water and loosely wrap the beans with the muslin or cheesecloth. Store the soaked beans in a warm dark place

I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoy cooking from your site. I am vegan and have made the following meal twicce now, once for guests and just this week for Christmas Eve dinner. Menu included: garden fresh tapas (I used vegan cream cheese and they were delightful), Spicy Lentil Soup (was a favorite for sure!), Chola (Chana masala) was yum yum, Bhindi Masala (spicy okra), and Aloo Gobi. Everything was so tasty and plentiful. I will be making this meal again for New Years dinner when I visit my son in Alberta. Thank you for sharing such tasty and easy to prepare recipes!

So great to see new recipes again, that too pretty much back to back! I love your today’s addtion- Raj Kacori. Just wanted to mention though this Tapas is NOT Vegan since it uses cream cheese ( Dairy is animal product). Rest fabulous! I am not a Vegan so won’t make a difference to me, but to some it may.

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Namstey Manjula ji..me and my family is pure veg..your recipes are really helpfull to make different kind of vegetarian indian food..i simply love it..specially pav bhaji recipe..my son love it..Thanks for being such great help to cook such delicious food..Regards !!!-Pooja S.